


One Night

by ultharkitty



Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-31
Updated: 2013-10-31
Packaged: 2017-12-31 01:17:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1025606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ultharkitty/pseuds/ultharkitty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Breakdown goes missing, Knock Out fears the worst. A bittersweet ghost tale for Halloween. </p><p>TFP AU with an element of worldbuilding taken from MTMTE. Contains references to canonical character death, ghostly goings on, intimacy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Night

**Author's Note:**

> There's a genre of folk tale told beautifully in [Three Black Feathers by Jim Moray](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQIVwnmddqg). I wanted to tell that tale with robots.

Knock Out was a realist. Three weeks had passed since his last contact with Breakdown. In a relationship where pings were sent minute by minute, where jokes and news and gossip were the background static to the working day, three weeks without contact was not just a very bad sign, it was the worst sign.

Knock Out sat on his bunk and stared at nothing. Breakdown's room was untouched, his few possessions gathering dust in his locker, his rations siphoned off and shared among the Vehicons. He hadn't planned on leaving. Something had happened. 

It shouldn't hurt like this. They weren't bonded, there was no physical cause for the gnawing void that sat where his spark should be, no reason for the ache, the yearning, the sensation that his insides had been hollowed out and everything that was left was made of glass. 

He wished there was someone else. A nobody, a warm frame, a pair of eyes to watch him, to remind him that he was a Decepticon and no Decepticon grieved for the loss of a lover. 

His chronometer rolled on. Eleven hundred hours and he was still vertical, still staring. Eleven thirty, and he'd spun through every scenario, every reason Breakdown could have gone off the grid, every possible cause for his silence. Every chance to think he was still alive, and every motive someone would have had for killing him. Every likelihood he had run into the Autobots, that he hadn't been able to call for help, that he'd gone down fighting. 

Midnight came, and a buzzer rang. Knock Out was at the door in two astroseconds, his everyday mask slipping into place. 

"I'm not on duty," he said smoothly, as the door slid aside. "What do you want?"

"It's me, I'm back."

"Breakdown?" 

"Don't look so surprised, I said I'd be back."

The grief shattered, the fear turned to vapour. Knock Out tugged him inside, and bolted the door firmly behind him. "Where were you?" 

Breakdown shrugged. "Got in trouble," he said. "But I'm here now." 

"Your comm's dead."

"I know." He smiled, and it was that same open, slightly hesitant smile Knock Out only ever saw when they were alone. "Let me make it up to you."

The air was cold between them. Knock Out closed the distance, cleaving to the buzz of Breakdown's energy field. Breakdown lifted him. Electricity crackled, their fields meshed, and scrap it was like he could feel Breakdown's spark against his own. 

"Sure," he said, as his partner drew him into a long, slow kiss.

* * *

Breakdown knelt by the bunk. "Time's up," he whispered. If only Knock Out would wake... But how could he explain this? One night, that was all he was allowed. 

He stroked Knock Out's cheek, the colour already seeping from his fingers. 

* * * 

Knock Out booted slowly, the last wisps of a dream clinging on: Breakdown at the door, turning to look at him. His voice soft, sombre, quiet. 

_'I can't stay,'_ he said, as the dream faded to nothing.

Knock Out stretched, relishing the warmth in his spark, his frame glowing like it hadn't in almost a month. That had been a good night. 

He rolled over and listened for the sounds of the washracks next door: a splash of water, a muffled curse, a scrap of song. 

There was nothing. 

He sat up, his optics booting. "Breakdown?" 

He must have gone already. Knock Out logged into the ship's datanet and brought up his partner's schedule. It still read 'missing in action'. That wasn't right.

He went to the door; Soundwave needed to be told.

But the door was bolted from the inside. His bunk was as flat as it never was when Breakdown had slept on it, his paint as smooth and glossy as though those large rough hands hadn't been all over him. 

Knock Out sat abruptly, only just making the edge of his berth. 

Something tapped against his claws. 

He picked it up without thinking. A liquid shimmered, trapped in a vial of glass as wide as his finger. A token of esteem, the kind of thing given to someone who was injured. Someone who was hurting. At either end were metal caps, each one scratched with glyphs as rough as the hand that had made them. 

Knock Out turned it to the light and read the farewell written there. 

His comm beeped: Starscream calling him to the bridge.

He curled his fingers around the vial; a chill settled in his chest and began to spread. 

"Goodbye," he whispered, and prepared to make his way through the ship alone.


End file.
